Cheetah 3D Online Registration

Cheetah 3D Online Registration

Hi,
yesterday I had my first look on the new Cheetah Version. The German Localisation is great! The new material system looks good, I did not understand it just yet, but I think it is very powerfull.

I also received my registration Number, Thanks!!!
In the near future I want to buy new Macs. (new Desktop and Notebook) When the Online-Registration is complete, is it possible to activate the Cheetah Software later on another Mac? Like in Creative Suite: deactivate and activate? Until now I am only in Demo-Mode because of this question

Hi,
at the moment the regnumber works for 5 activations. So you can buy quite some Macs and move Cheetah3D with you.

I will probably add an automatic deactivation feature soon. Its on my todo list.

So don't worry to activate Cheetah3D on your old mac.

Bye,
Martin

Thank you!!!

Online activation? Finally you have made pirates life more difficult, Martin!:icon_thumbup:

I really would like an option to deactivate Cheetah on a Mac. In the past I’ve worked for different agencies and therefore installed Cheetah on different Macs. I always deinstalled it so there’s no abandoned cat left on those Macs but my personal “install-counter” would have passed the “5”-mark.

Currently I don’t switch my Macs that often but who knows?

Neon said:

I always deinstalled it so there’s no abandoned cat left on those Macs but my personal “install-counter” would have passed the “5”-mark.

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Margus16 said:

Finally you have made pirates life more difficult, Martin!:icon_thumbup:

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No. You have only made the user's life more difficult.

I am VERY much opposed to (almost) any DRM. The answer's worth a 12-page essay, but I'll be brief.

Here's my counter-point in a catchy one-liner: Since "laws only affect law abiding citizens" using DRM to stop pirates is (mostly) pointless. (I can tell people are going to have fun quoting that out of context)

Here's the context for the catchy one-liner: I was bit by hardware locking last year. Due to a computer shortage at my school, I resorted to booting any computer I could use off of a portable hard drive. This not only allowed me to make any computer "mine", but also allowed me to keep my work in one place. I had a copy of Unity 3D (an awesome game engine with seamless support for C3D) on said hard drive for work on a project. However, Unity, like the new Cheetah, locks itself to the hardware. I found this out the hard way when it deleted my license file and said "try me". That would have been ok, but then, after changing computers again, the DRM, now apparently convinced I was some kind of criminal syndicate bent on dominating the world with portable hard drives, invalidated the trial, leaving me out in the cold. I eventually received a fixed computer and was given a school copy to register, however, it was extremely inconvenient.

Now, the point I would like to bring up is that, had I been using a pirated copy, none of this would have ever happened, and that, furthermore, using a pirated copy would have allowed me to use my legally purchased software IN A LEGALLY ACCEPTABLE MANNER AS PER THE UNITY EULA SECTION 1 PARAGRAPH 2:

Unity Technologies said:

A license of the Software may be installed on a total two computers or virtual machines

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Case. In. Point. Using DRM only truly hurts the people who respect you, and the people who respect you aren't going to pirate it anyway.

End self-righteous rant

As a coder myself I’m with Martin on this topic. The only thing I hope for is that if he ever stops developing Cheetah he’ll give a last Version without the check to the users so we can continue to use the last version.

I think when a programmer gives up on a product they should open source it unless they have some compelling reason not to. Indeed, I think that for a program to receive copyright protection the source code should have to be put in escrow, and released to the public domain when the program becomes unsupported or goes out of copyright. (Never releasing the source code of software actually undermines the intent of copyright law.)

No. You have only made the user's life more difficult.

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I agree with Dranix and Martin on this. One of the differences between C3D and Unity and -- say -- 3D Studio Max is that (a) the DRM is very light-handed, and (b) the software is frequently given free updates. If I run a pirate copy of C3D well there'll be a new version in a week or two and now I need to crack it again. Same with Unity. 3D Studio Max gets one huge update every eighteen months and the DRM is stupidly draconian. It's way more convenient to run pirate copies of Max than legal and once you're set up you're good for another year or two.

Having been an avid gamer for 3 decades, I have to say that there are company I ban now, due to DRM. I'm tired of paying full price for a game that I then have to keep either the manual, the CD case, a slip of paper, and or a particular CD of the set to get the thing to work. If I've purchased it, and have installed and registered it, that should be enough. Hackers crack these programs like it was nothing. Yet, I have to go through this mess every time I install. I like Martin's approach, in that the registration is in an email and I can easily make copies of the key for backup purposes.

Don't get me wrong. I do NOT, in any way, condone piracy. I'm just saying while I have to fiddle with getting programs to install (or not), hackers get to use the stuff without the hassle and for free. The program shouldn't be unlocked, unless it can be registered with the company online or on the phone.

An example of the frustration I'm speaking of from a player's standpoint was Blazing Angels from Ubisoft. I couldn't even get the thing to install and run, due to DRM called Starforce. It was a big deal that many paying customers had the same problem. I bought the game a year or so after it was released, when it was cheaper. By then, Ubisoft's forums had 9 pages of complaints from users, and no fix was ever pushed out. So much for my legally paid $20 or so. After that, one of the first things I look for when purchasing a game is whether or not it's by Ubisoft. If it is, I'm FAR less likely to buy it at all, regardless of how cool it might be.

I think we need to differentiate between giant developers with no customer service who give you a serial number in a box and then ignore you and indie developers who will respond personally to your emails when something goes wrong.

As a software developer myself, I use a system not unlike C3D's older registration system for preventing piracy -- but I've certainly thought about becoming more draconian. I think if you run into issues and Martin doesn't address them then by all means complain. But don't complain about hypothetical problems -- yes if Martin were going to suddenly behave like Autodesk it would suck. But since Martin isn't behaving like Autodesk, let's not start acting as if he were.

podperson said:

I think we need to differentiate between giant developers with no customer service who give you a serial number in a box and then ignore you and indie developers who will respond personally to your emails when something goes wrong.

As a software developer myself, I use a system not unlike C3D's older registration system for preventing piracy -- but I've certainly thought about becoming more draconian. I think if you run into issues and Martin doesn't address them then by all means complain. But don't complain about hypothetical problems -- yes if Martin were going to suddenly behave like Autodesk it would suck. But since Martin isn't behaving like Autodesk, let's not start acting as if he were.

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Podperson,

I already stated how I like the way Martin does the registration. The point I was making is about keeping it where it is and not making DRM harder than it needs to be.

And the point I was trying to make is how DRM has a habit of biting paying customers, not pirates. And, yes, I agree that Martin != Autodesk, I've heard from my Photoshop teacher that installing 3ds on their network is hell. Sorry for any excessive criticism, it's just that I've become slightly paranoid (ok, completely paranoid) after finding suid root binaries (Rootkit, anyone?) installed by Adobe.

I also think I fell victim to a bit of a telephone game. Martin said "registrations", Neon said "computers", and I said "hardware lock". Nowhere was it actually stated that Cheetah locks itself to the hardware. If it's only 5 registrations, then I totally agree, as it cuts down pirated serial numbers, and forces them to actually work at it.

Hi,
it true that activation sucks and it took me a long long time until I decided to use it. But please also consider that I get support requests from pirates. Pirates even asked me if they are entitled to a free upgrade since they got the pirated regnumber after Jan. 24th 2008. And finding registration numbers got insanely easy recently since Google displays them directly on their search results. So I was more or less forced to do something before it got out of control.

For the first I use activation on a test run. I want to check out how it works, how it influences sales, how much activation problems support it creates etc. After a few months I will decide how to proceed.

If it turns out that activation isn't of any real profit I will probably remove it.

Bye,
Martin

Martin said:

Hi,
it true that activation sucks and it took me a long long time until I decided to use it. But please also consider that I get support requests from pirates. Pirates even asked me if they are entitled to a free upgrade since they got the pirated regnumber after Jan. 24th 2008. And finding registration numbers got insanely easy recently since Google displays them directly on their search results. So I was more or less forced to do something before it got out of control.

For the first I use activation on a test run. I want to check out how it works, how it influences sales, how much activation problems support it creates etc. After a few months I will decide how to proceed.

If it turns out that activation isn't of any real profit I will probably remove it.

Bye,
Martin

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Please don't get me wrong. I wasn't suggesting removing it, myself. I would suggest, however, not to go with something like Starforce, which basically locked up the app, even though it was legitimate.

Martin said:

Hi,
For the first I use activation on a test run. I want to check out how it works, how it influences sales, how much activation problems support it creates etc. After a few months I will decide how to proceed.

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If it works I would be interested in that fact as I work on a bigger app myself and search a at least partly working protection for it.

Just a little info on some problem with the system:

Just installed 5.02 over my 5.0 installation and I had to re-register… Hope not every new update does that or my 5 regs will fast be gone...

Martin said:

But please also consider that I get support requests from pirates. Pirates even asked me if they are entitled to a free upgrade since they got the pirated regnumber after Jan. 24th 2008.

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Tell them "sure, I just need your machine's MAC address" and then lock that MAC address out of all future versions of C3D.

Dranix said:

Just a little info on some problem with the system:

Just installed 5.02 over my 5.0 installation and I had to re-register… Hope not every new update does that or my 5 regs will fast be gone...

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Could be worse... My copy of AutoCAD kept asking me to re-register. I didn't think anything of it until it ran out of registrations. Turned out to be an AutoCAD bug they hint at but don't admit to, it loses registration when external hard drive is plugged in. Now I get to call AutoDesk every so often just to get permission to use the software I bought.

But, I can understand why Martin chose to do the registration thing. Lots o' pirates out there!

Bill in MN

Martin said:

Hi,
it true that activation sucks and it took me a long long time until I decided to use it. But please also consider that I get support requests from pirates. Pirates even asked me if they are entitled to a free upgrade since they got the pirated regnumber after Jan. 24th 2008. And finding registration numbers got insanely easy recently since Google displays them directly on their search results.

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this is incredible...

I also had to double register 5.0.2.